Crisis Core: Should you report or let go the reporter?

There's a decent amount of choice in Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, and some are inevitably more impactful than others. One decision Zack will be faced with surrounds a Reporter going against Shinra's wishes in Midgar: should you report him, or let him go? 

Truth be told, Crisis Core is by no means a game laden in choice. In fact, compared to a lot of RPGs and even the original FF7, Crisis Core takes a lot out of your hands by putting elements such as how you level up Zack and Master Materia in the hands of the slots-style, mostly random DMW mechanic - but you do still get faced with player choice every now and then. Such is the case with the Reporter, who you can encounter in Midgar's Sector 8.

Report him, or Let him go - what to do with the Reporter in Crisis Core

The erstwile reporter in question is located in an alleyway in the Sector 8 - Fountain area, in the bottom right of the map of that area. He's there during the chapters of Crisis Core where you're free to roam Midgar (which cuts off at the end of either Chapter 7 or 8 depending on the version of Crisis Core you're playing - one of the game's points of no return). 

The reporter, a black man in a grey suit with a white shirt and red tie, is terrified of Zack on sight - because Zack is a Shinra employee, and he's currently trying to hide from Shinra forces. When you talk to him, you're faced with a simple choice: report him, or let him go.

What should you do? Well, you should let the reporter go. The reasons for this are twofold, though don't expect any major reward for doing so.

First of all, there's the moral reasoning - Zack is a nice dude even if he does work for the bad guys, and anybody familiar with the FF7 universe knows that Shinra is pure evil, even if Zack doesn't know this during Crisis Core. What the reporter is reporting on are things that come to light about Shinra during the events of Final Fantasy VII. 

Second, there is a minor reward in it for you - if you let the reporter go, he agrees to send his reports and information to Zack via email. The messages from the Reporter shed light on some of the shady stuff Shinra is up to during the events of Crisis Core - and help to give you a little bit more clarity on certain aspects of the game's story.

That's it for rewards, though. If you want more material rewards, you should look into some other side quests like finding the Wutai Spies, and the Seven Wonders of Nibelheim.